Nosh Pit

Beecher’s Launches Gluten-Free Mac and Cheese

Gluten intolerants rejoice, after months of recipe tinkering, the “World’s Best” mac and cheese is now made with rice pasta.

Posted by: Anne Larkin on Feb 22, 2012 at 11:35AM 1 Comments

Bringing delicious mac and cheese to the gluten-free masses.

Seeing as it says “World’s Best” right on the box, the folks at Beecher’s aren’t messing around when it comes to mac and cheese. The Pike Place cheesemaker’s original mac and cheese, made with a creamy blend of Beecher’s original Flagship cheese and the tangier “Just Jack,” sells all over the country, fulfilling America’s baked mac and cheese needs. Until now, those who are gluten-free have simply had to look on, hungry and mac-less.

No more. Last week, Beecher’s launched its “World’s Best Gluten-Free Mac and Cheese” after years of discussion and testing and tinkering. Founder Kurt Dammeier and Julie Riendl, marketing manager of parent company Sugar Mountain, tried over 30 kinds of gluten-free pastas, from corn to quinoa, finally settling on a rice pasta imported from Italy. They found it holds up best in the rich sauce and doesn’t have the intrusive flavor of some of the other wheatless versions.

The test kitchen has been a busy place over the last few months as the crew fine-tuned the recipe, creating the roux for the sauce with a variety of different gluten-free flours and sorting out how to combine the par-cooked pasta and sauce just so for the perfect final product.

And the tinkering goes on: the mac and cheese comes frozen, and can either be microwaved or baked—or a combination of both—every method resulting in a different sort of mac. The gluten-free noodles are a little more temperamental than regular noodles, and if they’re cooked for too long (or too short) they can get gummy. Dammeier likes to microwave then finish in the oven to get that crucial crispy crust. (And you can pop the frozen mac into your own dish for that just-whipped-this-up effect.)

However you wind up cooking it, it doesn’t taste like just an approximation of the famous Beecher’s mac—it really tastes like good ol’ mac and cheese, deserving of the lofty claims on the package. The noodles absorb the rich sauce that thickens as the dish rests, steaming, just pulled out of the oven. It certainly is a bit different from the regular version, the pasta is softer, lacking the familiar bite of traditional pastas. But really, anything smothered in nearly a pound of some of the best cheese out there is going to be good.

A tray of the new mac will run you $14, $2 more than the regular version, and is available at Beecher’s Pike Place shop or at sibling enterprise Pasta & Co. in Bellevue and at U Village. Gluten eaters will stick with the traditional version, but this is without doubt a cheese-laden blessing for those that can’t.

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Tags: Cheese, Gluten Free, On the Menu, Beecher's

New Restaurant 50 North Opens This December Near U Village

From the owner of Vashon Island’s The Hardware Store, a gluten-free-friendly restaurant that stays open all day.

Posted by: Jessica Voelker on Oct 28, 2010 at 03:09PM 2 Comments

Fish and chips from The Hardware Store.

50 North is the new mainland project from Melinda Sontgerath, owner of The Hardware Store. That Vashon Island eatery employs Daniel Ahern—he’s the former head chef at Madison Park’s Impromptu (now a pizzeria) and he’s also married to Gluten-Free Girl Shauna Ahern. (They recently wrote a book together.)

I called Sontgerath and asked her a few questions about the new venture, questions which she kindly answered.

Why open another restaurant?

Sontgerath says she hadn’t planned to open a second restaurant, but she was lured in by the space at 5001 25th Ave NE, near University Village. The 3,200 square-foot restaurant has an additional room upstairs with a grand piano—Sontgerath plans on holding private, catered events up there.

50 North will have a “totally different look” than The Hardware Store, says Sontgerath, but she plans to replicate the island restaurant’s cozy booths because “they feel good around your shoulders, you know what I mean?”

Can we eat the stuff we like from the Hardware Store menu at the new place?

Sontgerath is still working on the menu, but she promises 50 North will be making Hardware Store oldies like skillet-seared scallops with bacon and Granny Smith Apples, Crab cakes, Mahi Mahi fish tacos, buttermilk fried chicken, and fish and chips.

Will Ahern be the chef at 50 North?

Doesn’t sounds like it, however, “we definitely want him to have a presence,” says Sontgerath. “He’ll be involved. He’ll definitely have a say in the menu, especially as it relates to gluten-free items.”

Will it be open all day and all evening like the Hardware Store?

Yes. 50 North will open for breakfast and keep its door open through dinner service.

When can we come get some of that chicken?

Sontgerath aims to open in early December.

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Tags: New Seattle Restaurants, University District, Gluten Free

Gluten-Free Dining at Tulio

Chef Walter Pisano even offers…drumroll please…gluten-free pasta

Posted by: Kathryn Robinson on Aug 04, 2010 at 09:00AM 1 Comments

Okay gluten-free folks, we know you’re out there (judging from your extraordinary response to our recent Starbucks post )…so let us deliver you some good news for a change.

Chef Walter Pisano of Tulio has stocked his menu with gluten-free items. From beet salads with plums and burrata cheese to grilled calamari with controne beans and Romesco sauce to most of his meat entrees, Pisano’s got you covered.

He’s even doing gluten-free pasta items, like linguine with clams, and spicy Italian sausage orecchiette. Look for the specially marked items on both Tulio’s lunch and dinner menus.

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Tags: Gluten Free, Tulio

Starbucks Changes Drink Recipe, Sickens Gluten-Free Contingent

Whose responsibility is it when a beloved beverage goes toxic for some of its biggest fans?

Posted by: Kathryn Robinson on Jun 30, 2010 at 10:00AM 27 Comments

Gluten-free coffee? Yum!

For years, Bellevue lawyer and mother Meg Perrine went to Starbucks for its Coffee Light Frappuccinos, one of the only coffee drinks someone like Perrine, who has celiac disease, could safely ingest.

Celiac is but the most serious of the many disorders that can afflict a person whose body can’t tolerate gluten, a protein found in grains. A crazy amount of foods have it. But, as gluten-intolerant folks across the country have long known—Coffee Light Frappuccinos didn’t.

Until recently.

Perrine happened to be in a Starbucks a month ago when she overheard a barista mention a new recipe for the Coffee Light Frappuccinos. “Red flags went up for me, so I asked the barista if this new recipe was still gluten-free,” Perrine said. “The guy assured me it was.”

Stung before, Perrine asked to see the ingredient information, which the barista agreeably provided. “There in bold print: Gluten,” Perrine said. “Normally there are about 40 words that signify gluten without actually saying it…but this one actually said it!”

The barista was quick to apologize, but Perrine wasn’t satisfied. Over the next couple of weeks she visited no fewer than 12 different Starbucks stores, all of which had made the switch to the new Coffee Light Frappuccino recipe—but none of which had a single barista or manager who knew that gluten was now present in the drink.

One in Arizona even blurted, “That’s why so many people have been telling me they’re getting sick!” Perrine reported. (Those with gluten-intolerance undergo variously vivid bowel ailments when they ingest it by accident, but celiacs, like Perrine, suffer a more nefarious consequence: symptomless damage to the small intestine, which can lead to cancer.)

What up, Starbucks?

Starbucks never claimed its beverages were gluten-free in the first place, a spokesperson clarified. “We use shared equipment and handle gluten and allergens throughout the store,” she emailed. “I am hoping this is an isolated incident and sincerely apologize to the customer for any misinformation given. We always encourage our customers, especially those with serious health concerns such as celiac disease, to visit www.Starbucks.com and click through to the ‘nutrition’ page where all ingredients for food and beverages are listed publicly.”

Not good enough, insists Perrine. “In other words, Starbucks is saying that because they never claimed it was a gluten-free product, they don’t have to give notice, and don’t plan to give notice, even though it’s making people sick,” Perrine paraphrased. “Is that illegal? Absolutely not! But they’re aware it’s making people sick—and doing absolutely nothing about it. That’s what I’d like to see changed.”

How about signage in stores, clarifying to the gluten-intolerant that the new recipe is no longer safe for them? suggests Perrine. If the employees can’t be counted on to purvey the correct ingredient information, she says, that’s the least Starbucks should do.

In an email to Perrine, Starbucks’ Director of Blended Beverages Ian Cranna respectfully disagreed.

“It is not our policy to include additional ingredient information on in-store signage and we have no current plans to do that for frappuccino. We will be communicating this change specifically to all stores to draw attention to it in the event of customer questions.”

“Hundreds of thousands of people will get sick,” Perrine laments. “What a shame.”

Thoughts?

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Tags: Starbucks, Coffee, Gluten Free